One of the biggest threats that Adolf Hitler faced during the Second World War was from
resistance that emerged within Germany itself.
One of the most notorious attempts on the fuhrer of Germany’s life was the 20th July
Plot, in which a bomb exploded inside of his wolf’s lair headquarters.
It was planted by Claus von Stauffenberg, but following the failed plot, there were
large scale arrests inside of the Third Reich of anyone who was considered to have been
a dissenter or have some sort of link to the plot.
There were thousands of executions, and some were incredibly sadistic and were even filmed
so Hitler could watch them to see that in his eyes his brutal form of justice had prevailed
and been administered.
One man who was subjected to a horrifying execution was Erwin Von Witzleben, a German
Field Marshall who was linked to the plan to assassinate the leader of Nazi Germany,
and in the plan he was designated to become the Commander in Chief of the Wehrmacht.
However things did not go to plan.
Join us today as we look at the Brutal execution of Erwin Von Witzleben, and remember to support
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Erwin Von Witzleben was born in Breslau on the 4th December 1881.
He was the son of a captain in the Prussian army, and he descended from a long line of
military officers and members of the nobility.
As a young man he was part of the Prussian cadets, and he studied inside a military academy
near to Berlin and he then joined the Grenadier Regiment Konig Wilhelm I number 7 in Silesia
as a leftenant.
But throughout the years he then gained a number of promotions.
He was married and had a son and a daughter, and as the First World War broke out he was
involved in the conflict.
He served to begin with as a brigade adjutant in the 19th Reserve Infantry Brigade, and
was then promoted to become the company chief of the Reserve Infantry Regiment Number 6
in October 1914.
But he then became a battalion commander, and along with his unit he fought in Verdun
and in Flanders.
He wasn’t shy from the battlefield and was wounded and later awarded the Iron Cross first
and second class, but then he was sent to General Staff training following his injury
before he saw the war out as First General Staff Officer of the 121st Division.
But following the war, Germany had a number of severe conditions placed on it with regards
to the military, this included the limitation of only 100,000 soldiers to serve inside of
the Reichswehr, the new German Army, to ensure it did not become too powerful.
But Witzleben remained inside the military and he became a company commander, and in
1923 was appointed as a major.
He remained in the military before Hitler’s seizure of control, and remained in very powerful
positions including becoming a colonel.
But when Hitler did take control of the German State, Witzleben was transferred to become
the infantry leader 6 in Hanover.
He was made a major General on the 1st February 1934, and he then moved to Potsdam to become
the commander of the 3rd infantry division.
It was clear that he was a trusted and well respected member of the German military, and
Hitler it’s believed also valued his skill.
He was promoted to become a commanding general of the newly established Wehrmacht and the
Army Corp III in Berlin in September 1935, before the next year he became a General of
the Infantry.
But Erwin Von Witzleben was not the most ardent and staunch Nazi.
He was not a man who had links to the paramilitary freikorp after the war that eventually were
swayed towards the Naxi cause, and even a year after Hitler seized control, Witzleben
outlined his opposition to Hitler.
He along with other generals demanded that there was an inquiry looking at a number of
deaths from the Night of the Long Knives, the night where the SS purged the SA and carried
out many executions and killings.
But Hitler sensing this discomfort he had for the Nazi cause forced Witzleben into early
retirement, however he was recalled to military service when Hitler began to plan for the
Second World War, and he was seen as a competent and skilled general who would do more good
for Germany than harm.
However he became part of a group of plotters known as the Oster Conspiracy, which included
Colonel General Ludwig Beck, and even Chief of the Abwehr Wilhelm Canaris who were scheming
to overthrow Hitler early on to force a military coup which would then avoid a Second World
War beginning in a matter of decades.
They sensed that the war would be on the horizon following the Sudetenland Crisis, but the
fact following the Munich Conference Hitler was gifted land by other nations left the
plotters rather shocked.
Witzleben would have been important in the coup as he would have commanded his units
in Berlin.
However Witzleben in November 1938 was the commander in chief of Army Group 2 in Frankfurt,
and he continued to be involved in plotting against Hitler and the Nazis.
He had even planned to consider a frontal assault on the Nazi headquarters and to seize
Hitler.
As the Second World War broke out with the Invasion of Poland, Erwin Von Witzleben was
then a Colonel General and was in command of the 1st Army on yer Western Front.
Following the German invasion of France, he was involved in his forces breaking through
the Maginot line, and within three days his effective command of his men had forced a
number of French divisions to surrender to the Wehrmacht.
He was awarded the Knights Cross of the Iron Cross and then became a General Field Marshal,
and Hitler was very impressed with his actions and command.
He then became the Commander in Chief for the West succeeding Gerd von Rundstedt, but
he then left this for health reasons, and some claim that he was then forced to retire
again after he was dissenting against the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, and was
critical of this.
But as the Stauffenberg, or the July 20th plot ramped up to assassinate Hitler once
and for all, Witzleben was involved and he was considered a man who was key to the plans
to seize control of Germany.
The plotters would try to blow Hitler up in a bomb plot, and they would then appoint significant
people involved in the plot in positions of power.
Witzelben was to take over supreme command of the whole of the Wehrmacht and Germany
Army as the highest ranking German officer, meaning he would then ultimately be in control
of the war effort and the Army’s operations.
When the plot was all organised and scheduled to go ahead, things went a little bit awry
from Witzelben’s perspective.
As Stauffenberg was to place the bomb in the Wolf’s Lair, Witzelben was to arrive at
the Bendlerblock in Berlin, where the headquarters of the plot would be located.
However he turned up late, and as he arrived at 8pm it was already clear that the coup
had failed.
He was angry at the failure, and he knew how dangerous it was for him to be involved, and
he then returned to the Oberkommando Des Heeres HQ at Zossen.
However he was then the next day arrested at his country estate.
He was outcasted by the Wehrmacht, and he was accused of treason.
Erwin Von Witzleben was part of the first group of conspirators to be brought in front
of the court.
He had been kept in rather brutal conditions and had been interrogated by the gestapo and
presumably torture by them for information too.
Whilst inside of the courtroom, he gave the Nazi salute to Roland Frieisler the judge
who was presiding over the people’s court.
Freisler would berate the defendants and scream and shout at them, and it was clear what would
happen to them.
On the 7th August 1944, the same day as the trial began Witzleben was sentenced to death,
and when he spoke to the court with his final words he stated, ‘You can turn us over to
the executioner.
In 3 months the outraged and tormented people will call you to account, and drag you through
the filth in the streets alive.’
His trial was shown for the weekly TV newsreels, but Goebbels decided against releasing parts
as he didn’t want to draw attention to the plot.
But von Witzleben was sentenced to death quickly, and his execution was performed extremely
swiftly also.
It’s believed that on the same day, or in the early morning of the 8th August 1944 he
was taken back to Plotzensee Prison in Berlin.
Inside the prison, there was a brick built execution chamber inside of the courtyard
and here thousands of Nazi resistors or dissenters would be executed using the guillotine or
by being hanged on the beam that was found in the chamber.
Many people could be executed there within an hour, and some were hanged together on
the beam.
But Erwin Von Witzleben’s execution in particular was incredibly brutal.
Hitler had passed instruction to make sure that the people who tried to take his life
in the conspiracy experienced the worst kinds of execution.
He also gave the order for the executions to be filmed so he could watch them back as
he recovered from his grazes and wounds, and he would watch the sadistic killings back
in the comfort of his home.
He would allegedly even watch them back a number of times.
Erwin Von Witzelben would have been led into the execution chamber, and he was to be hanged.
As a military officer, he should probably have faced the firing squad, but as he was
deemed a traitor he was made to suffer.
On the beam were a number off meathooks, and also a thin hemp rope.
The people who witnessed his execution described it as piano wire.
This was incredibly brutal, as piano wire is razor sharp and if bodies were dropped
from height using it, it could lead to beheading as it would slice through the neck.
But also it caused blood to be get blocked very quickly, and if the person was not dropped
they would be lowered slowly so that the wire began to suffocate them tightly.
As the piano wire got tighter, blood would not flow, and the wire would sometimes cut
down to the neck bones.
It was incredibly painful and an ordeal could be stopped and started to make sure the most
suffering took place.
Many Nazi officers when this was done would not even be able to watch themselves as it
was too harrowing to see.
Erwin Von Witzelben was hanged inside Plotzensee’s execution chamber using piano wire, and his
ordeal was all carried out in front of the camera.
Hitler then watched this back a number of times.
Erwin Von Witzelben was an influential and important German military general who was
seen as a powerful and successful commander during the Second World War.
However he was a man who was not happy with the politics of the Nazi Party, and he decided
on a number of occasions to speak his mind about it.
He was ultimately part of the Stauffenberg Plot which if it would have been successful
would have placed him in a significant amount of powerful.
But as it failed, he faced the wrath of Hitler and the Nazi Party’s justice in which he
was executed in a harrowing and haunting ordeal inside of Berlin’s Plotzensee Prison.
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